News - 6/02

Pixar Sues Exluna Over PatentPixar Animation Studios has filed a patent infringement lawsuit concerning Exluna's Entropy rendering package, which, according to Pixar, represents an unauthorized use of Pixar's RenderMan computer animation technology. A statement on the Exluna Web site states there is no merit to the claim. Pixar has declined comment.

benchmark

Top 10 ProCDRS Price/PerformersDell workstations paired with Nvidia Quadro 4 boards recently achieved the best price/performance scores for the Pro/Designer ProCDRS-03 subset of the SPECviewperf 6.1.2 benchmark. The ProCDRS benchmark is based on PTC's CDRS industrial design software and consists of 10 tests, each of which represents a different mode of operation within CDRS.

The mean scores represent the combined, weighted results of the 10 tests, measured in the number of frames per second the machines were able to execute. The larger the numbers, the better the performance. The $ per composite figure represents the system price divided by the mean score.

To see how the same workstations fared in other benchmark tests, or to review results from additional systems, visit www.spec.org/gpc.